Music Beat
Coping with Covid can be tough on people’s mental health. But music helped local classic rock inspired musician Don Cassell get through it with a little bit of help from his friends. The result— the first Dark Wrangler CD ‘Liminality’ “ This album saved me,” said Cassell, who started working on a few of his songs with with Taylor Ackerman in January. Ackerman, along with Ryan, ‘Skinny’ Dyck and multi-instrumentalist Tyler Bird helped flesh out his songs. 
“They play everything on the CD — bass, drums, fiddle, keyboards,” he said.
The songs range from classic rock style to heartbroken country music.
He added bassist Dil Jopp and Danica Somme to sing background vocals.
“She’s got an amazing voice so I asked Taylor to bring her (Sommer’s) vocals up, so they are a prominent part of the second track ‘Light of Day.’
Cassell has also released one album with his other band In Cahoots and two with The Juxtaposers, a project which also included Ackerman and Bird.
“ We just got together and started jamming together on some of my songs. I realized we had something special, but I never thought it would turn out to be a CD,” he said, adding he met with Ackerman weekly in his North side studio, and came up with a song a week, which they eventually fleshed out for the CD.
The local trio, including Mark Hall on lead guitar , bassist/vocalist Ian Morrice and drummer Raz Bruce front and centre, played their usual array of classic rock and country music ranging from Def Leppard power ballad “Hysteria,” to ’90s country hit “ Dust on the Bottle.”
The band featured Donovan Howell on lead vocals, Barbraedian Nickel on bass, Devin Gergel on guitar and “Vijar Von Violence, the only one in a full mask, pounding away on the drums at the back of the stage.
Drummer Juno sang lead vocals on several songs including Bruce Springsteen’s “ Dancing in the Dark,” Hawkins added an impassioned version of Holly McNarland’s “Numb.”
